Re-Eidolon
From what I played, and what I have seen and can calculate here, Eilodon and Paladin are not worth a Druid . period. end of the discussion. Sure, if you don't like nature mana and are not neutral, and have no access to semi-powerful melee.. or "you can but don't want (why?) to try to use a powerful unit" then Eilodon are nice.
however that's restrictive in evaluating the str / balance of a unit.
Sure, when you lack any 10+str units, getting a Eilodon is good ; but it's not because Eilodon is good by itself... it's because your other "attacking" units are weak.
but it's nowehere as good as getting a Druid... even without any nature mana (druid without Nature has Lower base str (but greater with only 1 nature), has 2mvt vs 1mvt, can cast spells, and comes with a much cheaper tech... the cost of the Eilodon tech (23k) is almost the same as the whole of the Hunting guild techs until druid).
Maybe it's not that Eilodon/Paladin suck... only that Druid is OP.
And Sure, Eilodon having access to the demonic promotions is interesting... but that comes after level 6, and that means you don't take CA or Combat promotions or mobility and that doesn't offsets the low mobility.
(That said, it's somehow reasonnable that Eilodon are melee instead of Disciple otherwise they'll never get any xp when built by Evil civs.... but they still suck).
Re-Recon:
and whatever you say, in all my previous games, (save the ones where the Recon unit suck or is absent) : elohim, illian, ljos, calabim, Liurchips, Hippus...etc my "city-killer" unit was always a recon unit : +4str, +100xp due to being able to farm xp much more easier due to mobility and +50%vs animals.
Rangers and Satyr are good (and better than most units of same category) whether you are svart or not.
- Rangers have no city attack malus. and 9str. and 2move, and easy xp due to bonus against animals. (and access to +5 str easily ; +2 with capturing that scorpion, that you can't do without the hunting guild)
- Satyrs have 2mvt, and HUGE base str... without taking into account their nature affinity (but you already said that other civs might dislike nature mana)
in all my previous games, melee were used as last option, mostly due to:
- no "more str class"
- 1 movement.
- 20% CA is fun... but only when targetting cities. And most of your xp needs to come before that ; so until late game, your melee units are worse "xp-ed" than mounted or recon ; and late game, your early recon units are so xp-ed that they mow through that ennemy civ all alone, without even waiting for mages or for the melee units.
Even for Paladins.. I only use them with spiritual leaders... because it offsets their low mobility !
Re-Svartalfar
and even if what you say were to be correct "I can only comment for Svart" ...
then take my comments as meaning "SVART are an bizarely constructed civ".
- They have a powerful defender melee unit in their Roster... that is not useful in reality... (when compared to their recon options) --> then remove that unit from the rooster !! or focus it even more on defense so it's used only in defence (give it CD1 as free !). But 600metal for a defender-only unit is expensive...
- They are supposed to focus on RECON, but while they have 3 recon units, 2 of those are not useful for the most of the game : Assassin is a niche recon unit (and IMO its 10str is too strong), and Slayer is a tier V unit, available only at the end game : so for most game, the Svart uses their base unit, 7str... or guild/religion unit and not Roster units (which seems strange) (at least they synergize with the Hunting Guild UU and the FoL UU...).
- They are EVIL, and cannot go easily to NEUTRAL with their THEMATIC / and sole useful religion :
- EILODON suck for them: it is a worse unit than their rooster melee unit, which itself is not really useful for Svart... and in a much more costly tech.
- They have no way to get HP in a reasonnable way due to slow XP gain for disciples of evil civs.
- The RECON tech line, which is supposed to be their FOCUS doesn't open any unit until TIER V
Anyway,
Sure, Svart emphasis the str of recon units (due to sinister)
For me that "emphasis" does not show that Svart synergise well with recon (yet they do, somehow), but mainly it highlights that Recon can easily be OP.
But why is the "dexterous" promotion not giving the feeling to ljosalfar that "Archery is OP" ?? IMO it's because Archery classes and promotions are less strong than recon one.
And I never encountered that feeling in other games, with other whole UNIT-Line... it sometimes happened with a specific unit_type... but those are transient, but I never felt, with any game that "melee is OP", or "mounted is OP"; on those games, I might find that "malakim syngergize well with disciples... lets make a priest-army" or "Elohim Monk is very good for my Elohim game", or "2 mvt melee units from scratch (windsword) make using melee units fun !" ...Etc It was not that the melee/disciple classes are OP, only that I get, using my civ, so many bonus toward this unit category that it becomes predominant and useful.
Svart don't get much bonus for recon... no XP bonus, no Production bonus, no mobility bonus... only one bonus : the sinister promotion (which is a good bonus btw)
That said, I found that recon class and disciplines makes Recon the most powerful units, whatever the civ I play with.
the games when it's not true are the ones where
- Your roster has no decent recon unit (or like Sheaim, your recon always transforms into melee)
- You lose one of your civs "core design" if you go for hunting guild (to get ranger) and/or FoL (satyrs) in early/mid game (mostly when you need other guilds first: arcane / priests / healer circle / craftsman / slavery for your roster-units or UB) and when you synergize better with another religion (and satyr unit is not worth abandoning the whole other benefits of the other religion.. which is normal reasoning btw).
Those examples do not show that melee or archer or mounted are stronger than recon. It only shows that when some civs theme or game-play doesn't allow for easy recon units, they don't use them.
The only games I did not use recon as main oever-xp-ed units is when I stopped playing for a long time and had no decent recon unit in roster, and forgot that FoL had satyr, and wanted to try other guilds than Hunting guild to see if they were interesting, to discover them.
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